First Meeting
by Blitzindite
Summary: A Bothan. Sam had never seen a Bothan in person before. They were shorter than they'd expected. (Star Wars/JSE Egos Crossover)


Warnings: Language, Guns, Minor Violence, Choking  
Characters: (humanized) Septic Eye Sam, Marvin the Magnificent, Chase Brody

_(( I'd like to direct you to the one-shot Supply Run if you haven't read it yet; may want it for context on Sam and Marv for this AU. Italics are a translation and mean they're actually speaking Mando'a in this. Also, this version of these two have admittedly poor impulse control and think more with their fists than their heads ^^" ))_

* * *

Sam was glaring behind their helmet. What else could they do? It wasn't like Marvin was going to _listen. _The other Mandalorian had taken his helmet off a while ago; it was sitting proudly on the console overlooking the stars beyond their ship. He'd been so focused on avoiding the bounty hunter's shots he hadn't put it back on yet.

"_You've really done it this time," _the younger muttered as they crossed their arms huffily.

"_Sami. Zip it."_

"_I can man the—" _their ship lurched as a shot hit the shield, forcing Sam to momentarily brace themself on the console, _"—gun."_

Marvin huffed a laugh and spun the ship into a disorienting spiral. _"Gun? It's still out of commission from the last time."_

"_I thought you got it fixed!"_

"_I got it _scheduled _to get fixed."_

"_So what you're telling me is you pissed a bounty hunter off—_on purpose—_and now we can't even defend ourselves? Marvin!"_

"_Hey, don't blame me! I maybe…didn't think it through like I should have?"_

"_You're _entirely _to blame. They weren't even after us until you decided to upset them!" _Even so, Sam had to bite their cheek to keep from grinning behind their helmet. _"And here I thought _you _were supposed to be the mature one." _

Sam wasn't even sure either of them had bounties on them to begin with. Maybe if they'd ticked off the wrong person in a tavern or some collector wanted genuine Mandalorian armor, but that was all they could think of.

Whatever. Didn't matter. Bounty or no, a hunter was still pissed off and trying to shoot them down.

The next time the ship jolted, both humans were thrown forward and into the console. Sam's helmet smacked against it, easily protecting their skull from the impact.

Marvin…wasn't so lucky. The helmet he'd rested on the console had fallen off and rolled away somewhere while its wearer crashed his unarmored head against the steering. He instantly fell limp in his seat.

"_Marvin!" _Argh, this is why you keep your helmet on unless you _know _you're safe, Sam thought with gritted teeth as they lunged from their seat to drag Marvin out of his. Moving the far taller man into the seat behind the pilot's was a struggle, but they eventually got the harness strapped snugly across his chest and took the pilot's seat for themself.

Okay, okay, this was so much more complicated than the single-manned ships Sam had flown before, but. They could do this.

…They hoped?

Coruscant was close, their shield was holding, they could—

They grunted as another shot connected. Sam took control of the steering and accelerated the ship as much as it would go. Coruscant, Coruscant, get to Coruscant. Dammit, this shouldn't even be happening, Marvin!

Sure, they'd both be laughing about it later, but—another shot connected—but it wasn't exactly fun in-the-moment when they were left without a way to defend themselves.

Entering the atmosphere, Sam checked the blip on the radar. The hunter was still following.

Nearly crashing into a docking cargo ship, Sam swerved and brought the ship lower. Speeders were left nearly crashing into each other and buildings and pedestrians to avoid them as the Mandalorian ship flew far lower than it should have, as it took too-sharp turns that clipped an awning and knocked out the window of a shop, as it skidded to a jarring stop into the intersection of an alley with a nearly empty street.

Tripping over themself, Sam scurried out of their seat and to one of the lockers, fumbled with blasters and ammo. Over other vehicles, they couldn't pinpoint which one, if any, belonged to the hunter, but they weren't going to take any risks. One more peek at Marvin—still out cold—and they were slamming the release for the door. The ramp descended as it slid open and Sam risked a peek.

There it was. It was landing, blocking them in. There wasn't enough space to turn around and leave the way they'd come, and the hunter hadn't left enough room in the street to fly forward.

Great. Wonderful.

The hunter to exit the rival ship was Trandoshan, and he looked furious. Ah, even better…

Next time they sparred, Sam would have to be sure to knock Marvin on his back end for this one.

Kneeling just behind the exit and peeking around it at the hunter, Sam waited, watched, as the Trandoshan approached.

Deep breath, raising the blaster to their shoulder, one, two—

Sam jumped to their feet and out of the ship when the hunter started firing. One shot hit their shin, beskar easily protecting it as Sami tried to activate their jetpack. A blaster bolt hit it instead, and they were left scrambling to pull it off and throw it aside before it combusted.

Just as the device left their hand, they were being shot at again. Another bolt hit their pauldron, throwing them off-balance and ruining their shot.

They'd never faced a Trandoshan. He was stronger and more experienced than the young human; before Sam even knew what was happening, they were pinned with a clawed foot pressed against their throat. Gagging as they tried to suck in a breath, Sam wrapped their hands around the man's ankle and tried in vain to shove it away, feet kicking in an attempt to strike the Trandoshan.

He hissed at them and growled…something. It was in Basic, but Sam's mind wouldn't register it.

They pounded on the man's ankle, tried digging their nails into it but their gloved hands only slid against his scales without purchase. Their head started swimming; they couldn't breathe.

Then, the weight was gone, and they were left gasping and coughing as both hands came up to clutch at their neck. When their vision stopped spinning, Sam sat up and crawled to where their blaster had fallen.

The Trandoshan was stalking back to his ship while spitting curses at… Huh. Someone else had decided to join the party.

A Bothan. Sam had never seen a Bothan in person before. They were shorter than they'd expected.

The Bothan had two Corellian hounds on thick leads; both were growling at the Trandoshan and looked moments away from attacking him. There was also an assassin droid crouched on the ramp to his ship with a blaster readied.

Sami swallowed, rubbed at their throat once more, then brought their blaster back up to their shoulder. The Bothan completely ignored them (though the droid took to aiming at them instead), opting instead to watch the bounty hunter until his ship finally took off.

When he did finally look to Sam, he rolled his eyes and spoke…Ithorese? to call the droid off.

"Hey, easy, man." His Basic consisted of a thick accent, like Sam would expect an Ithorian to sound if their throat was shaped right to actually speak Basic. Throaty, growly? They weren't sure how to describe it.

"Hello? Coruscant to Mando?"

Sam blinked and hesitantly relaxed their stance slightly, though kept their blaster poised.

"What? Is it your turn, now?"

"Hey, no need for hostilities. I hate hunters as much as the next guy. 'Sides, we had nothin' better to do than lend a hand." He holstered his blaster and loosened the hounds' leads. They looked more or less calm, now, but Sam still eyed them.

"What do you want?" Their eyes flicked over the man's attire—loose, comfortable, easy to move in. At his droid—in good shape, but its parts looked like they'd been taken from multiple sources and not repainted to match each other. His ship—oh, that's definitely a repurposed junker. Sam's mouth twisted downward. Smuggler? "Lemme guess. Payment?"

"Look, buddy. If I'm being honest, I _originally _wanted to just hang back and scavenge whatever was left of your ship when that bounty hunter was done with ya. But my droid wanted to help out and it's pretty hard to say no to him."

Sam arched a brow skeptically. "…The assassin droid wanted to help?"

"Slink..? No, no! My astromech—he's still on board." His fur startled bristling slightly, eyes darting to the streets beyond. "Look, man, authorities are on their way 'cause they don't exactly take well to blaster fire. 'Specially not in the city's upper levels; probably gave a few rich folks heart attacks if I'm honest. But, ah…" he gestured for their ship, "you're probably not gonna want to take off in that."

Whether it had been Sam's poor flying, the hunter's shooting or…Sam's jetpack. it had been Sam's jetpack blowing up, hadn't it? that had a fuel line leaking, they weren't completely positive, but certainly had a good idea which of the three it was, if not a combination of all of them. They couldn't help a frustrated groan.

"Yeah… Uh, look. It'll probably be dragged off to a warehouse somewhere where you can either buy it back or steal it back. I could care less. I suggest taking your valuables out of it, planting a tracker, and going elsewhere for now."

"Can't _you _fix it?"

"Sure. Just not before police droids start showin' up." The Bothan clicked his tongue and turned to the assassin droid (Slink? Was that what he'd called it?) and started speaking in Ithorese again. The droid hummed and took the hounds from him, then disappeared into the junker. "Okay. Uh. I was gonna head off for Ryloth, but I could give ya a ride…wherever you needed to go, I guess?"

"I don't—"

"Yeah, yeah, sure. Deal. _Fuck _my head…"

The Bothan looked momentarily surprised at the new voice. Sam just rolled their eyes and crossed their arms. There was Marvin with helmet tucked under one arm while his other hand rubbed at the welt in his head.

"_You missed all the action," _Sam teased in their native tongue.

Marvin scoffed. _"Just go get our weapons and credits." _Then, turning to the Bothan, he gave pause, thought for a moment; he didn't know Basic as well as Sam or the other man did. Then, "If you could take us to Mandalore? I'll pay you well for it. But try anything…" He rested a hand over the blaster on his hip.

"Sure. Whatever. Y'know I'm not stupid, right? Not puttin' my dogs or crew at risk by pissin' one of you off. Just get your stuff and hurry up."

Weapons and credits collected, a tracker placed where it wouldn't be found, then back to the junker.

Sam couldn't help but eye it skeptically. "Is that thing even safe?"

"Pretty sure she's the one standing while yours ain't even fit for takeoff."

"…Touché."

The Bothan laughed at that. "C'mon, police are just about here." He tapped an earpiece, then gestured at his ship. "I've got one of my droids watchin' street cams—" he (or his droid) had hacked the city's cameras? "—and we're gonna be closed in on shortly."

Sam cast one more look to his comrade. Marvin had slipped his helmet back on at some point, and only offered a shrug.

"I'm Chase, by the way," the Bothan threw over his shoulder without looking at them. "Anything I can call you two?" Neither answered, to which he just snorted. "Eh, suit yourselves. Setting course for Mandalore."

* * *

_ (( I've. Never actually written anything from Sam's POV? let alone a humanized Sam's? hope it turned out all right ^^" I've always imagined Sam as sassy. That, paired with being fairly young in this AU, makes for what you see of them here ))_


End file.
